


The Soul Bond Activation

by DylanOhbrien



Category: The Big Bang Theory (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Episode: s03e23 The Lunar Excitation, Eye Contact, F/M, First Meetings, Green Eyes, Other: See Story Notes, Soul Bond
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-12
Updated: 2018-01-12
Packaged: 2019-03-03 15:46:22
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,775
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13344381
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DylanOhbrien/pseuds/DylanOhbrien
Summary: Sheldon couldn’t see green. That only meant one thing: an inactivated soul bond.





	The Soul Bond Activation

**Author's Note:**

> Please don't hate me but Amy is barely in this! More information about that at the end notes. :)
> 
> Please feel free to point out any errors.

Sheldon couldn’t see green. That only meant one thing: an inactivated soul bond.

The soul bond phenomena ― as it had came to be called over the years ― was present in roughly sixty-five percent of the human population, with higher probabilities for meeting your soul mate in more developed areas of the world with the help technological advancements. While there was no fundamental biological difference in the bodies of those with soul mates compared to those without, those with soul bonds lacked the ability to see the color of their soul mate’s eye in all capacities. For example, those with a soul mate who happened to have green eyes were unable to see any varying shade of green. The same could be said with those who happened to be unable to see brown, or blue, or any other shade a person’s eyes could possibly be.

Studies done by ophthalmologists had long since discovered what was preventing a person with a soul bond from seeing the full color spectrum. Particular parts of the rods and cones within the eye were inactive in those people with a soul bond that had not yet been “activated,” as it was referred to. It was the commonly accepted theory that these parts of the eyes became active when the bond was activated and the brain was flooded with chemicals such as oxytocin and dopamine, among many others.

Scans of the brains of those who’d met their soulmate days prior showed extremely high levels of chemicals in the brain that slowly decreased over time, but scientists had yet to manage to predict a pair of soul mates, and thus the world had yet to see just how the brain lit up in the exact moment that a soul bond was activated. Sheldon himself was curious to see what that would look like compared to the other brain scans in existence.

He had his own theories about the phenomena, but nothing quite so concrete as to be bold enough to claim that he knew all there was to know about soul mates. In fact, there was a lot Sheldon didn’t know about soul mates. Including, for the first few years of his life, that he _had_ one.

Sheldon couldn’t see green. It had surprised everyone.

It had certainly taken Mary Cooper by surprise. To learn that her little Sheldon was actually the perfect half of someone else was a shock to her, to say the least. Now, while Mary loved her son as much as any mother could, as his personality began to develop, she was a little doubtful that the boy would have a soul bond. After all, Georgie didn’t have one. And while Georgie was a spitfire in his own right, his personality had nothing on Sheldon’s. Not when the boy had already memorized over a thousand different kinds of train

But when he was four years old about to enter school, the doctor ― as they often do ― suggested he and Missy get their eyes checked out to see if he had a soul mate. Most children, and even some adults, weren’t able to tell that they were missing a color as they’d been unable to see it their entire life and were used to it, thus assuming that that’s simply how the rest of the world also saw color. The test was simple enough to perform, and most everyone gets a test done in their youth. 

“Oh, God bless you,” Mary had said, arms hooked underneath Sheldon’s bottom as she clutched him against her chest. Missy clung to the bottom of Mary’s dress as she stood on the floor with her other fist in her mouth. “But is it really necessary?”

A part of Mary hadn’t wanted to know if Sheldon didn’t have a soul mate.

“Well,” the pediatrician had said from his swivel chair. He scratched at the gray hairs that grew along his jaw. “We recommend it for most children who are starting school so you can help them understand what it means if other kids bring it up, or if they find their soul mate and don’t understand what it entails. Most parents do it.

“In fact, I remember you doing it for your eldest and he was found to not have a soul bond,” he said softly. “Are you nervous about your other two children not having a soul bond? It’s perfectly normal, you know. Well over a billion people don’t have soul mates.”

Mary bit her lip, and looked at her son. Sheldon was patiently flipping through a pamphlet about asthma. She glanced down at her daughter. Missy was fiddling with her hair now and looking mighty impatient at the fact that the pediatrician was still talking.

"Mother," Sheldon said suddenly. "I think I have asthma."

“I suppose we might as well,” Mary said finally, hoping she wouldn’t regret it.

The test had been performed by a nurse in another room and was done quicker than Mary had remembered when she had it done in her youth. Afterwards, the nurse promised Mary that the test results would come in the mail in a month’s time. Then she’d been sent off with her two little children in tow, and that had been that.

All that was left to do was wait.

That month had been completely nerve wracking for Mary Cooper. She watched her young children going about their business without a care in the world, knowing that one day she would get the letter that could change their futures. The letter that _would_ change their futures, no matter what.

The letters came in the mail within the month, as promised. The paper was stark white and looked far more foreboding than a letter really ought to.

It took her perhaps longer than it should have, but she opened Missy’s letter first. The girl was just like every other pretty little four year old girl living in Texas, and Mary wasn’t fretting over Missy’s future nearly as much as Sheldon’s. Something in her gut just _knew_. Even if her daughter didn’t have a soul bond, she had little doubt that Missy could find someone to love.

She opened the letter.

_“Upon examining the eyes of your daughter, Melissa M. Cooper, it was determined that her eyes showed sign of inactivity associated with that of a soul bond. As all other eye exams have shown Melissa Cooper’s eyes to be in otherwise healthy condition, it must be assumed that Melissa Cooper has a soul mate._

_Based on the data, it is most likely that Melissa Cooper is unable to see the color brown.”_

Mary signed a breath of relief. At least there was one piece of happy news. Her daughter had someone out there that was just for her. She put that letter down and then moved on to the next one, the one with Sheldon’s name printed on the outside in neat black letters.

Her fingers shook as she tore the letter open.

_“Upon examining the eyes of your son, Sheldon L. Cooper, it was determined that his eyes showed sign of inactivity associated with that of a soul bond. As all other eye exams have shown Sheldon Cooper’s eyes to be in otherwise healthy condition, it must be assumed that Sheldon Cooper has a soul mate._

_Based on the data, it is most likely that Sheldon Cooper is unable to see the color green.”_

Mary blinked at the words. The hoarse laugh that came out of her mouth was completely unexpected; the silent stream of tears that followed were not.

* * *

 By the time Sheldon had surpassed both Missy and Georgie in educational level and was at college, he’d started actively avoiding any conversation involving a soul bond. It had been easy enough for other people to assume that he was without a bond for some reason that was beyond him, and he never bothered to correct them.

And when he had finally reached adulthood and left Texas for good, no one bothered to ask him if he had a soul mate anymore. Which Sheldon was immensely grateful for, as it was of little surprise that Sheldon had some difficulty in keeping a secret for absolutely any length of time. He certainly wasn’t able to hide anything from his family, and even well into adulthood he had some trouble keeping his mouth shut in front of Leonard and the rest of their acquaintances. Yet, despite this tragic tendency to constantly and consistently “spill the beans,” as it were, the only thing he had been able to stay silent about in those many years was that he was unable to see the color green.

Sheldon couldn’t see green. No one in California knew this.

It wasn’t particularly hard to pretend that he could see the entire color spectrum; and the one time Penny had not so discreetly asked if he was missing a color from his life, Sheldon has simply turned his nose away and said, “Of course not. Soul bonds are a bunch of nonsense if you ask me. They aren’t any guarantee of a happy and healthy relationship like people like to pretend they are. My parents were soul mates and look how they wound up. As were Leonard’s parents, and they were no better off than mine.”

“Hey, you leave my parents out of this,” Leonard called back from behind the kitchen island. Leonard had never asked if Sheldon couldn’t see a color. Perhaps he’d just assumed, like all those other people that waded their way through Sheldon’s life in his youth.

“I am just trying to prove a point that soul mates are a bunch of nonsense.” His palms were sweaty. Somehow he felt as though they’d see right through him; that they’d look deep into his eyes like the doctors had, and they would know the truth.

Instead Leonard just rolled his eyes and that had been that as far as he was concerned.

Penny, on the other hand, had a forlorn frown tugging at the corner of her lips. Now Sheldon wasn’t the best at being able to decipher human emotion, but he could tell that what he said had somehow upset Penny. Perhaps it was because of how dismissive he was about soul mates when she herself had absolutely lost herself in the phenomena.

Ever since she’d met Leonard and brown illuminated her life, she was obsessed with knowing all about her friend’s love lives and whether or not they happened to have a soul bond. She’d gone on to learn that Howard miraculously was unable to see blue, which was a tad unbelievable as Sheldon had honestly never expected someone like Wolowitz to even have a soul mate.

When she asked Raj, he had said, “Except for one of my brothers, no one in my family has been born with a soul mate. Most of them have been able to find love despite it,” all while holding the beer that he’d needed in order to speak to Penny about the situation. “I wasn’t any different. I do not mind, though. Not anymore. I think it adds a sense of mystery to romance.”

As she had done with Sheldon, Penny pouted unhappily. Perhaps Sheldon’s perception of soul bonds wasn’t what made Penny upset. Then what was it that she was sad about? Many people without soul bonds engaged in romantic relationships with each other and were able to live rich, fulfilling lives. In the same breath, Sheldon had seen his fair share of soul mates crash and burn.

(In his opinion, the soul bond promised nothing. It was no guarantee that two people would be happy together, and it irritated Sheldon when people assumed that to be the case.

Relationships still took an unbelievable amount of effort and willingness to accommodate this other person. To act as though just because someone was your soul mate would mean that you wouldn’t experience any problems was poppycock.

Perhaps that was simply bitterness speaking. Sheldon wasn’t sure anymore.)

“I think that’s sad,” Penny had said, and Sheldon silently congratulated himself on being able to successfully read Penny’s emotions correctly. “I couldn’t imagine life without Leonard. Seeing brown for the first time was a wild experience. I wouldn’t trade it for the world.”

Raj smiles, and then points his beer bottle at Leonard from across the room. “Leonard, tell me, what was it like seeing green for the first time?”

Sheldon blinked at that, glancing up into Penny’s colorless eyes. He knew they were green, of course, but he still couldn’t grasp the color. When Leonard started speaking, Sheldon could do nothing but listen. Leonard had been blown away by the beauty of the color. Green was the grass beneath their feet, and it was the color of trees that blew in the wind all year round in Pasadena. Green was the color of Sheldon’s Green Arrow shirt, not that he knew what it actually looked like. Green was the color of Penny’s eyes.

Green was the color of Sheldon’s soul mate’s eyes.

Sheldon couldn’t see green. Leonard could, now. That stung, for some reason.

After realizing that Leonard something in his chest tightened for a moment. Green. He’d never longed to see green, per say. It was more of a general curiosity that there was a color that Sheldon’s mind and eyesight simply couldn’t comprehend. Still, he’d lived most of his adult life willing to accept that he just couldn’t see it, and the only way he would was when a stranger that was said to be his perfect match just decided to waltz into his life.

 _Green_. How foolish.

(His heart still ached, for some reason.)

Green. Green. Sheldon _still_ couldn’t see green.

When he suddenly stood on his feet and claimed, “I need to urinate,” before stalking off without another word, he hoped nobody would notice his shaking shoulders.

Later, after Sheldon could find the comfort of privacy in his room, he stopped to truly consider what would happen if he met his soul mate one day. That conversation between his friends had left him, for perhaps the first time, with the realization that there in fact was someone out there that could unlock the color green for him.  It was frightening to admit that, though, that he really did have a soul mate. Admitting it would make it real, and Sheldon wasn’t ready to risk the chance that he would end up in a toxic relationship like his mother and father, or like Leonard’s parents.

Still, even with this knowledge, he suddenly couldn’t get green out of his mind. This was when his problems started.

While Penny had seemed to drop the fact that Raj (and Sheldon, as far as she was aware) didn’t have soul mates, she was still pretty forlorn about it and seemed to find comfort in her own soul mate.  Usually he had trouble reading people’s emotions, but in that moment Sheldon was absolutely positive she was thankful that she did have a soul mate.

And, for the first time in his life, Sheldon saw what two soul mates should be like. Having lived his youth in a toxic environment where two soul mates had a failing relationship did a number on his own opinion of soul bonds. He’d been so used to such a negative outlook on the bonds that he had never considered the possibility that he wouldn’t necessarily have that type of relationship with his own soul mate. Then he saw Penny and Leonard. While they were polar opposites in absolutely all aspects, they were somehow full of love and admiration for each other. Somehow they fit together so well it was almost seamless.

Sheldon… Sheldon wanted that. He wanted someone who understood him inside and out. He knew that while Leonard and Penny, and even his mother certainly loved him, they didn’t necessarily understand him. He wanted someone to understand him.

For the first time in his entire life, Sheldon had hope; he had a strange yearning to meet this person with green eyes.  But with those first tendrils of hope came a thick and heavy fear that settled deep in his chest and refused to budge. He’d spent so long avoiding the concept of soul mates that he wasn’t even sure how to start looking, or how to cope with all these emotions he was suddenly subjecting himself to.

Sheldon caved.

* * *

_Knock. Knock. Knock._ “Penny.”

 _Knock. Knock. Knock._ “Penny.”

 _Knock. Knock. Knock._ “Penny.”

The door swung open, and Sheldon looked into Penny’s colorless green eyes. Something about them almost made his resolve crumble. Could he really do this? Could he finally tell someone after all these years of keeping it to himself.

“What’s up, sweetie?”

She was staring at him expectantly, and when Sheldon opened his mouth to tell her the truth, he couldn’t get the words out. His mouth hung open for a moment, and then snapped closed. He tried two more times before Penny got tired of him flapping his mouth open and closed like a fish and pulled him into her apartment. Sheldon went without any protests, letting Penny shove him onto her couch and pat his shoulder lightly before she walked off to her kitchen.

He watched silently as she casually rummaged through her cabinets. “What are you doing?” Sheldon finally asked as he saw her reach into the cabinet and pull out two wine glasses. She followed that up with pulling out a bottle of wine from her refrigerator. “Alcohol? At this time of day?”

“Well, it’s five o’clock somewhere. In any case, you look like you needed it,” Penny said, pouring a generous amount into the glass.

“What gave you that impression?” Sheldon sputtered.

“Oh, I don’t know,” Penny said, making her way back over to him and all but shoving his glass against his chest. “Maybe because you looked like you really wanted to tell me something but couldn’t. I always think a bit of wine really loosens up the tongue, let’s you get things off your chest.”

Sheldon looked down at the drink in his hand with disdain, and then downed it as quick as he possibly could. By the time he finished draining the glass, Penny was at his side, hand hovering just over his back.

“Whoa. Sheldon you might want to slow down you don’t want to―”

“I can’t see green,” Sheldon blurted, and then coughed loudly. Wine really did burn going down all at once like that.

Penny blinked at his declaration, not reacting for a moment. “I’m sorry, what?”

Sheldon clenched his jaw. He really didn’t want to say it again, but Penny’s confused stare left him with little choice. Curse her. “I can’t see the color green,” he repeated.

His heart was pounding in his chest. He’d said it. He’d said it _twice_. It was finally out there, and there wasn’t a thing he could do to take it back.

Just as his panic was finally settling into his bones and he was moments away from breaking out of his own skin, his words seemed to finally be registering to Penny. Her eyes grew wide at and he quickly looked away towards the door so he wouldn’t look at her as she went through what was undoubtedly going to be far too many emotions. “Wait a minute. Does that mean you have a―”

“Don’t say it,” Sheldon cut her off, quickly glancing at her. He sighed when he saw Penny blink in surprise and obvious confusion, and he looked away again. Not many people react this way when they tell someone that they have a soul mate. After a moment of tense silence, Sheldon took a deep breath and started speaking. “Yes, I have a… a soul mate.”

“Sheldon, I’m really glad you told me,” Penny said softly. She gently patted his back a few times before her hands settles back into her lap. “Why’d you lie about it the other day? Does anyone else know? I mean apart from, well, your soul mate.”

“My mother and father, as well as my siblings,” Sheldon answered, still not looking at Penny in the fact. “My Meemaw knows as well. Ricky Jackson and his mother from church. Garrett Thomas from preschool. The entirety of Johnson Elementary School thanks to my sister Missy. That’s it.

“I stopped telling people when I got to college, as I had no worry of my brother or sister blabbing as I was sure neither of them would have the capacity to attend a university for any length of time,” Sheldon continued, wringing his hands together to keep his nerves at bay. “I haven’t told anyone for quite some time.”

“You really haven’t told anyone else?” Penny asks. Sheldon shakes his head. “Why not? Why are you telling me now?”

“I suppose it goes back to your previous query about why I lied about not having a soul bond. I don’t want to be held down by the societal pressure that I must put my soul mate above all else, and if other people knew it would be a topic of conversation I am not comfortable integrating into my life. I am perfectly content with the life I currently lead, and I do not need them to come barging into my life and changing everything. That is not to say that I won’t care for them if I do eventually find them ― nor is the fact that we are soul mates an indicator that we will have a healthy relationship. There are far too many variables that are unpredictable, and I don’t like not knowing the odds. We know so little about soul mates and how they come to be, and I am simply supposed to accept the fact that this person that makes color appear in my life is the one I am meant to be with? It’s preposterous,” Sheldon said, fingers moving to grip his knees. “That being said, you and Leonard seem to be very happy with each other, and for the first time I found myself wondering.”

“Wondering what?” Penny’s voice was gentle.

“Wondering what it’s like to see green,” Sheldon admitted, the back of his neck burning. “It’s foolish of me to have those kind of thoughts as I cannot control when, or if, I eventually come to see the color. Did you know that out of the four point nine billion people with soul mates, about seven percent of those in developed countries never find their soul mates?”

“That doesn’t seem like a lot!”

“That’s over three-hundred and forty-five thousand people, Penny,” Sheldon said with a scoff.

“Nevermind,” Penny responded with a grimace.

“Penny, please do not tell anyone,” Sheldon said, looking up at the blonde. “I don’t want anyone to know that I have a soul mate. I’d never hear the end of it. As it is my mother never fails to ask me if I’ve met my soul mate at least once a month. Being questioned about this on a daily basis would be torturous.”

“Of course. I won’t tell a soul,” Penny promised, and then paused. “But… why did you tell me?”

“Have you yourself not told me that getting something off your chest is therapeutic?” Sheldon asked. “And there was certainly no way that I was ever going to tell Leonard, let alone Wolowitz and Koothrappali.”

“Good point,” Penny said pursing her lips. “I won’t tell anyone. Thank you for trusting me with this. It’s really brave of you, Sheldon. But you know, these feelings are completely normal. Before I met Leonard I also didn’t want to meet my soul mate. I came here for my career first, and love second. But here I am, no better off than when I first moved here, but at least I have love, and someone who supports me. If you’re open to new possibilities, a soul mate becomes more exciting than scary.

And besides, no one expects you to completely give up your career or your lifestyle for a soul mate. Everything is going to be fine. You don’t need to freak out over this. Trust me.” Penny smiled at him, and Sheldon’s shoulders felt a bit lighter.

“I suppose you’re right,” Sheldon said.

“Of course I’m right,” Penny snorted. “Now let’s get you back home.”

Sheldon stood up and his head immediately felt light. He stumbled around for a moment before Penny helped steady him onto his feet. “Oh my,” he slurred slightly, that cursed Texan accent coming out of his mouth. “Seems as though I’ve had a bit too much to drink.”

“Yeah, you had one whole glass you wild animal,” Penny snorted. “Come on, I’ll help you to your room. Lean on me. So tell me, do you think your soul mate is a male or female?”

“Who’s to say,” Sheldon responds after he managed to get his bearings. “I’ve showed interest in neither sex my entire life. Oh! Perhaps they could be a robot.”

“Sweetie, you’re not Howard,” Penny said, and Sheldon chortled. “Now come on, one foot after the other.”

As Penny was helping Sheldon back to his room, he found himself feeling grateful that he’d actually told someone the truth, and the world hadn’t stopped spinning (actually, thanks to that drink the world was spinning a little _too_ fast now). As it were, he’d already lived quite a successful live thus far without a soul mate, and just because he’d finally told someone of his own volition, that didn’t mean that this other person would just come waltzing into his life anytime soon.

Too bad no one told Howard and Raj that.

* * *

After Penny introduced Howard to his soul mate Bernadette, he’d told Raj about a dating website he used to frequent before he’d met her. Raj, understandably, was outraged to be left out of the loop like that.

“I cannot believe that you signed up for a dating website and didn’t tell me. We could have been each other’s virtual wingmen,” Raj whined as he followed Howard into Leonard and Sheldon’s apartment. “Now you have Bernadette and the whole point is moot.”

“Raj that was forever ago,” Howard tried to reason with him. “I’m sorry I didn’t bring this up when I signed up for that stupid dating website a long time ago. I wasn’t even sure if you could even talk to women through the internet!”

“Ha, ha. Very funny.”

Truth be told, Howard liked to consider himself to be a very lucky man. Sometimes when he took a good look at himself, he was amazed that there was actually someone out there that the cosmos had deemed to be his other half. When Bernadette had walked into his life and brought the color blue along with her, it immediately became his favorite color in the entire world.

Prior to finding her however, he knew that he wasn’t exactly the most desirable bachelor in the world, but he’d be damned if he didn’t try to pick up every girl whose eye color he couldn’t see. Ergo, he turned to online dating to help him bring in as many blue-eyed beauties as he could. He had been on eight ― twelve if you counted the ones that showed up and walked away at the sight of him ― dates by the time that Penny had set her up with Bernadette and then his world was finally at peace.

Everything had been perfect! Until he accidentally mentioned that he was on a dating website for a while to the collective group and Raj had flipped. When Raj found out that Howard had been meeting girls via dating websites without telling him, he had quite a few thoughts of his own.

“I just cannot believe you didn’t tell me that you were off being a ladies man while I was wasting away at home with nary a person by my side to stroke my hair,” Raj complained, choosing to ignore both Howard and Leonard’s snorts.

“I can’t believe that Howard even matched with anyone,” Leonard responded.

“Hey, I got tons of matches in like the month or two I was on that website,” Howard defended himself. "If I hadn’t met Bernadette, I would be killing it right now.”

“God, that website can match anyone, huh?” Leonard said, brows raised tauntingly.

Before Howard could come up with a snide response, Sheldon burst through the door, clutching a few Lego pieces in his hands. Without preamble, he announced, “Leonard, I need your help. This is a dire emergency. I dropped a necessary piece of my Lego Death Star underneath Penny’s couch and there is no way I am reaching down there with my bare hands. It is of the utmost importance that you help me in the matter,” and then immediately turned on his tail and walked off without another word.

Leonard blinked in confusion at the spot where Sheldon had been standing a moment prior. Then he let out a resigned sigh and started following Sheldon to the apartment across the hallway. “I’ll be back. Try not to break anything while I’m gone.”

The door slammed shut behind Leonard as he followed his roommate to the adjacent apartment, and then there was a minute of silence before Raj said, “Say, do you think that website can really find a match for _anyone_?”

“Raj, you’re selling yourself short buddy. You’d make any girl happy,” Howard said smugly, patting his friend on the shoulder.

“I’m not talking about me,” Raj said, sounding scandalized as he shook off Howard’s hand off his shoulder. “I was talking about Sheldon. We should sign _him_ up on that dating website.”

“Yeah, right,” Howard snorted.

“No, think about it,” Raj responded, trying to reason with Howard. “We make it an experiment. Like when Frankenstein’s monster was lonely and he found a wife.”

“He didn’t find a wife,” Howard interjected, raising an eyebrow at his best friend. “They built him a wife out of dead body parts.”

“Okay, we’ll call that plan B.”

While both Sheldon and Leonard were gone from the apartment, the two took the time to boot up Leonard’s laptop to go the website that Howard had been mentioning for most of the night. It had been easy enough to type in Sheldon’s basic information (height, age, eye color) but their little experiment really got interesting when they got to the questionnaire portion of the dating profile.

Raj had, in all honesty, not been completely serious about this experiment involving Sheldon and the dating website. It seemed like a fun thing to try ― his next short lived obsession that would keep him entertained for a couple of days ― but he hadn’t actually expected it to go anywhere. After all, this was Sheldon he was talking about.

That being said, he’d be damned if he didn’t give this experiment his all.

“What is your attitude towards online dating?” Howard read the question out loud and then snorted and typed in what he thought would be Sheldon’s answer to such a question. “That’s an easy one. Online dating is nonsense and the algorithms they use are a bunch of mumbo jumbo. Moving on.”

Raj pursed his lips and stopped Howard from moving on to the next question. “No, no. I think that Sheldon would say hokum instead of mumbo jumbo.”

“What about malarkey?” Howard asked, hand raising to cover his lip as he thought.

“No, he saves that for special occasions,” Raj said, shaking his head. “Hokum is definitely the way to go.”

“Hokum it is!”

They slowly made their way through the series of questions, giving each and every one of them a great deal of consideration before typing out their answer. Leonard had come back to the apartment covered in dust at some point, stalking off towards the bathroom and saying, “I’m gonna take a shower.”

When they reached the end of the questionnaire, Howard leaned back in his seat and stretched. “Well,” he said, rubbing his eyes lightly. “I’ve done all I can. Now we just wait and see.”

“How long will it take?”

“It depends,” Howard said with a shrug. “When I first signed up I got a match the next day. They started trickling in pretty regularly after that. There is a _lot_ of people on this website Raj, I’m telling you.”

“What are you two doing?” Leonard asked, padding back into the living room wearing his robe. He was running a towel through his wet hair.

“Trying to perform miracles,” Raj answered.

* * *

Amy Farrah Fowler.

For a moment, Raj couldn’t believe what he was looking at. He was reading the words, but somehow he just couldn’t really believe them. There was absolutely no way this could be real. No way.

“Holy crap.”

“What is it?” Howard glanced up from his phone where he had been texting Bernadette about what she wanted for dinner. One glance at Raj’s slack-jawed expression and all thoughts of food flew out of his mind.

“Well,” Raj said after a moment. “We seem to finally have proof that aliens walk among us.”

“What?” Howard asked, nose wrinkling in confusion. “What are you talking about?”

“The dating site matched a woman with Sheldon,” Raj exclaimed, voice high and shrill as he wildly gestures towards the laptop screen.

“You’re kidding. An actual woman?” Howard was shocked.

“Yeah, look! Breasts and everything.”

In a flash he was flying across the room to get a look at this so-called woman that was apparently a perfect match for Sheldon. A rather plain looking girl with what were admittedly some nice green eyes stared back at him.

Amy Farrah Fowler.

Howard knew, from what Sheldon had previously told them, that he was born without a soul bond. Which was unsurprising to Howard ― a bit insensitive of him, perhaps, but that was just how he felt ― as he had trouble believing that anyone out there was perfectly suited to Sheldon’s unique brand of crazy. Yet here was this website saying they had actually found someone that was perfect for Sheldon Lee Cooper.

“You know,” Leonard said suddenly, startling Howard out of his thoughts. The two looked away from the screen over to Leonard, who was sitting on the couch and fiddling with his phone. When he learned about what they’d done, he couldn’t have cared less about the whole plan. “I think that you guys should really think this through. In the wise words of Dr. Ian Malcolm, ‘you were so preoccupied with whether or not you could, you didn’t stop to think if you should.’”

“What are you talking about?” Raj said. “And stop quoting Jurassic Park at me.”

“I’m just saying.” Leonard shrugged. “What if, by some miracle, you guys actually just found Sheldon a girlfriend? Have you ever stopped to actually picture Sheldon with a _girlfriend_?”

“You know as well as I do that Sheldon Cooper will never get an actual girlfriend,” Howard said with a snort. “I’m not even sure if he has functioning genitals. I’ve never seen him to much as glance at a woman.”

“So what exactly are you two hoping to get out of this exactly?” Leonard prompted.

“A bit of fun,” Raj answered. Leonard just stared at him with a blank expression until Raj let out an exasperated sigh.  “Oh, come on! Sheldon will probably drive this girl away within the first five minutes anyway. Let me live, Leonard!”

“Fine, but don’t say I didn’t warn you,” Leonard said, shoving himself off the couch and making his way to his room.

Raj pouted until Howard patted his back soothingly. “Come on, Raj, you have to look at it from Leonard’s perspective. He’s got to live with the guy. Imagine if, by some weird miracle, he did manage to get a girlfriend? It would absolutely affect Leonard’s life.”

“It’s what he deserves,” Raj huffed, and then turned back towards the screen. Whatever. Right now, Dr. Sheldon Cooper has to send an e-mail to his perfect match. Greetings, fellow life-form…”

* * *

A dirty sock. Of all the things, it had to have been a dirty sock. Sheldon hesitantly walked through the door of the coffee shop, with Raj and Howard following behind him. His eyes stayed glued to the floor.

(When the pair had first confronted Sheldon about making him a dating profile and finding a match, Sheldon’s heart all but burst out of his chest.

Green. Green. Oh God, green.

He was just starting to accept that fact that he did have a soul bond, and he was working his way towards being fine with meeting this other person one day. Now he had to deal with someone who, according to this website, was actually a good match for him? Sheldon wasn’t ready for this.

He had to talk to Penny.

It had been simple enough to navigate through a tense conversation with Koothrappali and Wolowitz and confuse them so he could escape across the hallway to Penny’s apartment and get some advice. He muttered something about dating websites being hokum (which, despite his nerves he still agreed with) and made his exit as quick as he could and high-tailed it to Penny’s apartment.

 _Knock. Knock. Knock._ “Penny.”

 _Knock. Knock. Knock._ “Penny.”

 _Knock. Knock. Knock._ “Penny.”

The door opened. Penny smiled at him. Her eyes were still colorless. “Hey, Sheldon, what do you need―”

“Koothrappali and Wolowitz signed me up for a dating website and now they want me to meet this Amy Farrah Fowler woman that matched with me,” Sheldon said in one breath, effectively cutting Penny off. “What should I do, Penny? I’m not ready to meet my soul mate, I told you this!”

“Whoa, calm down Sheldon,” Penny said, stepping sideways to let Sheldon through the door. “Why don’t you come in and we can talk about this a bit more.”

Sheldon nodded mutely and made his way through the doorway and sat himself down onto the couch. Penny closed the door behind her and then said, “So, slow down and tell me what happened exactly?”

“Apparently,” Sheldon started, deliberately slow, “Koothrappali and Wolowitz signed me up for a dating website, and I matched with a woman named Amy Farrah Fowler. Now they tell me that they have arranged for the two of us to meet at a coffee shop tomorrow afternoon. Oh, this is a disaster Penny. I’m not ready to meet my soul mate."

"You don't have to go," Penny pointed out. "It was unfair of Raj and Howard to spring this on you, but you really don't have to go if you're not comfortable with it.

"I don't?"

"No Sheldon, you don't," Penny responded. "Just stand your ground and they'll eventually give up. Trust me. Raj and Howard? They're quitters. And anyway, there's no guarantee this girl is your soul mate anyway."

Sheldon blinked owlishly. "You're right. Thank you, Penny. You always know what to say."

He got up and left just as quickly as he'd come. He ignored Penny calling out, "you're welcome," to his retreating back.

Everything would be fine, he assured himself. All he had to do was stand his ground, like Penny had said.

It would be fine.

“Sheldon,” Raj said the moment that Sheldon opened the door and came back into his apartment. “I have hidden a dirty sock somewhere in your apartment. Unless you are willing to come with us to meet this girl, it will remain there forever.”

Sheldon gaped. “You’re bluffing.”

Raj smirked in response. “Are you willing to risk it?”

“Curse you.”

And that had been that. Sheldon’s fate had been sealed.)

He couldn’t let them know that he was nervous because he still had an unactivated soul bond and this entire “date” was really testing fate. Sheldon glance up and looked at Howard and Raj.

“In a few minutes,” he said. “when I gloat over the failure of this enterprise, how would you prefer I do it? The standard I told you so? The classic neener-neener? Or just my normal look of haughty derision?”

“You don’t know we’re wrong yet,” Raj pointed out.

“You are forgetting that I do not have a soul mate, ergo this entire point is moot as it will be sure to end in failure,” Sheldon pointed out, but his throat got a little tighter when he claimed not to have a soul mate. He hoped they wouldn’t notice. “In any case, haughty derision it is―”

“Excuse me,” a voice to his left called out. “I’m Amy Farrah Fowler. You’re Sheldon Cooper.”

Sheldon looked to the origin of the voice. First he saw a purple striped sweater, and then mud brown hair, and then―

 _Green_.

**Author's Note:**

> The reason Amy only has the one line is because I wanted to write about Sheldon's journey (although to be honest the first draft of this was through Amy's POV completely) in having a soul mate first and foremost, and I felt like seeing the color for the first time was a good place to end it.
> 
> I'm open to writing a second chapter to explore just what type of relationship Amy and Sheldon would have if from the get go they know that they're soul mates, if people are interested in that.


End file.
